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Equality, Parity, and Visibility

11th February 2018

Rebecca Cooney

North American Executive Editor for The Lancet | @BekRx

February 11 marks the 3rd annual International Day of Women and Girls in Science. This year, the selected theme is “Equality and Parity in Science for Peace and Development”, acknowledging the efforts that need to be made to promote the role of women in science as well as the critical contributions that can be made by women, through science, to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

In observance of the event, a two-day forum was held at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, Feb 8-9, 2018, in collaboration with the Permanent Mission to Malta and the Royal Academy of Science International Trust (RASIT).

The connections to the SDGs may not be obvious when we think about concerns like eradicating poverty and hunger, but strengthening the participation and inclusion of women in science and technology is likely one of the most important foundational steps in making progress in gender equality and social justice more broadly. It is impossible then not to discuss the role of women in science without highlighting the greater context and the deep gaps that must be narrowed. Only two thirds of countries, for example, have gender parity in access to elementary education. The road to receiving an advanced education is far more elusive and harrowing for many girls because of myriad deterrents, including lack of resources, safety concerns, domestic demands, and early marriage and motherhood.

In high-income countries where conditions are more conducive to education access for girls, there are still major deterrents. Even though girls tend to scholastically outperform boys early in life, powerful forces of stereotyping undermine performance and perception in middle and high school and prevent many girls from selecting science and math-oriented college majors. For those women who have gone against cultural expectations and discouragement and attained advanced education in science and technology, career prospects are staggeringly inequitable. Women comprise less than 30% of the world’s researchers and fewer still occupy leadership roles. When they do, they are not remunerated equitably. In the US, women in technology, engineering, and science occupations are paid less than 80% of their male counterparts’ earnings.

In the most recent issue of The Lancet, we editorialized the movements in addressing some of these fundamental inequities, calling 2018 a “year of reckoning for women in science”. Indeed, potent campaigns like #MeToo have shifted attention and conversation to acknowledging the systemic abuse and oppression women experience—and the world of science is by no means immune from such harmful occurrences. Ask any woman scientist whether, at some turn in her career, she has experienced bias or harassment and she will undoubtedly answer in the affirmative. The Lancet has also taken our next step by issuing a call for papers that unpack the issues, the systematic barriers for women in the sciences, as well as where measurable improvement has been made.

There is a great power in acknowledgment that even after decades of progress, inequity is steep, harmful standards persist, and issues of personal safety and unwanted contact or advances are not being adequately addressed or prevented. The UN agenda and the work being done by many academic-facing communities of women in science are absolutely necessary. But there also exists the need to simultaneously pledge ourselves—as individuals—to correcting and improving the outlook for all women in science.

It is often through very simple means that we can make a difference for a new generation of women scientists. When I was in finishing my senior year of college, right after I had been accepted to graduate school, the chair of the department asked me to coffee. She had a reason to do so: to talk with me about how difficult it had been for the women who had gone before me to make the transition and to finish their graduate degrees. It was then that I first learned about the leaky pipeline, the slow drip of talented, hard-working scientists who had to make difficult life decisions that ultimately took them away from their chosen fields. She told me that she was always a phone call away, that her door was always open. I took that message to heart and it has stayed with me.

Within each of us is a role model and an instrument of change. It doesn’t necessarily need to be a formal or academic capacity that we serve each other. Perhaps in its most essential state, it is about being present and visible—giving girls and young women accessible models and fair representations of who we are as scientists and people.

At the UN event, I was struck by the words of one of this year’s Girls in Science recipients, Maria Jose Solis Rivera from Costa Rica, who asked, “Who dares to stop us?” As the many attendees and I clapped, I considered those sentiments. The sad truth is that it is not just a deeply flawed system that can stop us, but it is often ourselves. Whether feeling the toll of imposter syndrome, engaging in unproductive comparisons with our peers, trying to balance the demands of parenting and caregiving, worrying about being too “gendered” or not gendered enough in our behavior, or failing to challenge privilege and injustice, there are so many ways that our journeys in science can be impeded.

On this International Day of Women and Girls in Science, alongside calls for bringing about equality and parity, let us also make it a call for lifting ourselves up by being visible.